FC (the erstwhile Kentucky Fried Chicken), part of Yum! Restaurants International, has finally decided to come out of its hole. After limiting itself to Bangalore for years, it has now worked out an expansion plan to cover the rest of India. It started the process by setting up an outlet in Chandigarh in November 2004. In the next five years it wants to be present in all the big cities. "KFC is a youthful brand and three sets of people have been identified as it core audience," says Sharanita Keswani, director, marketing, KFC India. "First, young adults; second, young families with kids between seven and 12 years of age; and third, teenagers."

KFC entered India in 1995. But a controversy surrounding the levels of monosodium glutamate in its preparations and protests from farmers� groups and animal rights activists soon landed it in a hot soup. By 1997 it had shut down all but the one outlet in Bangalore. Since then, it has added three more outlets in Bangalore (along with the one in Chandigarh, KFC now has five outlets in total). In the next six months it will expand its reach to cities such as Ludhiana, Kolkata, Pune, Hyderabad and Delhi, among others. By the end of 2005 it wants to take the number of outlets to 15. ... more